I assume by "raw" photography you mean the photographer shooting in a raw format and postprocessing it in Lightroom or another raw processor. Since the title by itself is a bit confusing.

One thing to realize is that client photography is very different beast. You can ask any wedding photographer, and they will fully admit: they make all the photographs orange AF. Color temperature: warm. Highlights: orange. It's a meme. But it's also what the clients (e.g, the people being married) wants, and that's what matters in the end. The kind of photography you're asking is that kind of photography. This is something you can talk to your photographer about.

To more philosophical about raw formats, the reality is that there is no such thing as an unedited or unprocessed photo. Not in analog, or in digital. When you shoot in JPEG, it's still processed - the camera just bakes it in immediately.

Nor does the sensor always track what our eyes see. A common one pretty much everyone has experienced is that our eyes have a much, MUCH higher dynamic range than any camera sensor. I'm sure everyone has taken a photo and ended up with a bunch of dark blobs when it was perfectly clear to your own eyes.

Is it more or less true to reality when a photographer boosts the shadows in lightroom to squash the dynamic range down? I don't think it's clear cut.

The moving of post-processing from before the shot is taken to after does change things in practice, but I don't really see it as a matter of "soul" or not. It allows the photographer to shift more of the final output from the world of randomness to intention, but if that is what takes the "soul" out, then surely all drawn art is completely soulless by that lens, since the entirety of a painting - every stroke - is carefully intended by the artist.

Hard disagree, the majority of professional photos will be taken in raw. Some photographers process the hell out of it, others are really subtle with the adjustments they make. I am willing to bet you have looked at countless photos that were processed raws and not even realized. Simply because you have such very specific expectations of how processed raw photos will look like.

Edit:

BY RAW PHOTOGRAPHY I MEAN THE EDITED OUTPUT OF RAW FILES TRANSFORMED INTO IMAGES BY PHOTOGRAPHERS

This is all photos you encounter in any professional settings and a lot of additional photos made by amateurs as well. Photos in magazines, photos next to news articles, photos on any company website, photos used in advertising, wedding photos, portraits, hotel listings, real estate listings, etc, etc.

I honestly think you have a very specific aesthetic in mind, rather than just edited raws. But without concrete examples, I simply can only disagree with the statement as is.

I think you framed the question a bit confusingly, and people get stuck on debating "RAW" which is standard for most professional photographers, when what I think you're trying to say is that you dislike a certain "perfect" aesthetic, which is reminiscent of commercials. I think most people would be happy if their baby photos came out looking "like a Pampers commercial" because that's a metaphorically (and often literally) airbrushed version of reality. They don't want real, they want something that looks perfect in the way that parents view their children as perfect angels. But if you don't want that, there are surely photographers that could accomodate that, but as others have mentioned, that needs to be communicated.

Most people don't know what they want or can't express it, so any sort of "art made on demand" like commercial portraiture involves a lot of guesswork. But to a certain extent I can see what you're getting at. For example, modern lenses are ultra sharp, to the point of sometimes being too revealing when used for things like portraiture. They're made that way because (presumably, I'm not an optics designer) it's easier and cheaper to make high quality optics now, and also, they need to keep up with ever increasing resolution. But I know there's been a trend of people using things like "black mist" filters on modern lenses, which create a softer look. And of course, even in the past, people were using tricks like shooting through semi-transparent gauze or applying vaseline to a filter in front of the lens to create the effect of smoothing out skin in a time before Photoshop and digital editing made all that easy to do in post.

I can sort of understand what you're getting at, but I think if you want "less perfect" photos, you need to give your photographer references. Portrait photographers know what most people want, and know that most people aren't capable of verbalizing it, so they develop a style that satisfies most clients. But there are definitely ones out there that have more unique and less "lifestyle advertisement" like styles, they might just not be your average commercial portrait photographer. And I'm sure even an average commercial photographer could at least partially accomodate your requests if you actually give references and examples of what it is you want.

I'm actually not sure what you mean by "raw photography" in this context. Are you talking about shooting with raw formats? If that's the case, the problem probably isn't with the raws insomuch as you simply dislike a common style. I don't use Lightroom anymore, but I noticed that it's attempts to automatically balance everything made all of my photos turn out very boring, and so I avoided it like the plague. A lot of portrait photography is taken as a commodity rather than a creative pursuit, so it wouldn't surprise me if the photo studio you hired was just clicking that "Auto" button and calling it a day, especially if they're just using bare light bulbs to light the scene.

I think part of what might be bothering you is that the photo shoot you described sounds just... Staged. Photo shoots usually are, but I think that it just felt more obvious than usual. Maybe due to the lighting and editing, maybe something else.

You compared raw photography to paintings, and honestly, a lot of portraits aren't meant to convey emotion but just record someone's appearance. I see professional family photos like the ones you described as similar. Personally I don't really feel much emotion from those sorts of photos (besides amusement at outdated fashion or tacky matching clothes), I consider them records of what the family looked like at that point in time. So, that might be part of your issue.

When I saw your title, my first thought was a photo album from my grandfather predating most modern postprocessing techniques. We went through it a few weeks ago and I was blown away by his eye for photography. Plenty of the photos were just happy memories and moments, capturing the family at various events, but he managed to frame some of them pretty artistically. The ones I remember most were of his kids sitting behind their birthday cakes, with only the candles lighting their faces. There were other photos that had strangers, but I had the passing thought that I wouldn't mind hanging those up on my wall.

So I think your issue isn't (just) raw photography, but the execution making it feel too staged and perfect. There are ways to address that. Off the top of my head, the setting alone can really change the atmosphere. One of my favorite photos of me and my cousins was the six of us on my grandparents' jungle gym as adults grinning at the camera, and it evokes nostalgia because we grew up playing on that. You can also play around with props, like your kid with their favorite toy.

I sort of have mixed feelings on the subject. If I'm shooting for myself, I'll usually try to introduce some form of hard limitations like film, compact or Polaroid. And these limits force me to be far more creative to communicate a cohesive narrative. I'll go into a shooting session with a clear idea of what techniques and composition I'm aiming for and will work towards that outcome. My next shooting day is to get multi exposure, low-light cityscape shots on Polaroid. Last time I did it was a big waste of film but I have a bit more of a plan with this attempt.

But when i was doing paid shoots, I'd take the best gear I had and take the safest shots I could and fix it to be as conventionally clean as possible. If a client saw an interesting style on my portfolio or online and asked about it while planning the shoot, I'd practice the technique and have the gear ready for the day. If they ask for it during the shoot, I'd try my best with what I have and fix it in Lightroom. If I see an interesting opportinity, I'll point it out and ask client give it a try.

The issue is that the language of photography is very different for everyone. Consumer electronics did not help by only focusing on performance stats while social media only really rewards clean shots in templated composition. So photographers play into those expectations and customers have a hard time understanding that there are other options.

You know that you don't like the outcomes from your baby shoot. But do you know what you would have liked? Would you have liked bokeh style shots where it's sharp subjects against an almost dreamy blur background with beads of light. Or high contrast grayscale where washing out the colors exaggerates the subjects features and expressions. Or would you have enjoyed Light-Painting where you play with lights around the subject over longer exposures and it creates a magical spark effect.

All of these techniques require a lot of practice to get right for customers and a lot of photograpers with rarely get to employ these skills unless they can sell it to the customer.

I’m going to speak from the angle of what attracts me to particular styles of photography/editing, which may or may not be broadly applicable, but I suspect it is.

The photos I like usually convey a particular feeling or mood of one kind or another and in some sense make me as the viewer feel like I’m looking at one of my own memories or maybe had somebody else’s telepathically copied into my brain.

For this to work, a certain coherence, clarity, and intentional composition that makes the hardware the photo was shot with kind of melt away is required. This doesn’t necessitate perfection — things like a little bit of noise can in fact enhance the sensation in some circumstances — but other kinds of obvious tells can pull me out of it. This type of shooting and editing is kind of like “natural” makeup in that it goes unnoticed when executed well, even if it’s actually quite heavy.

I could see how this might make for an overly normalized or produced impression for some.